Tag Archives: faith

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I Just Want to Dance

I walked from 50th and 7th west to Hell’s Kitchen, listening to old music on my iPhone and silently reminding myself that yes, Frankie, the best is yet to come. I carefully avoided that street where Mr. P used to live — or rather, crash on some girl’s couch — in the months after we broke up. It’s on that block where my favorite South African wine bar with pretty white lights outside is. It’s on that block where I tried the only piece of sushi that’s ever made me sick. It’s on that block that on a smoldering summer day last year that I gave away yet another piece of my dignity to a man who never earned it.

I cursed those thoughts away last night, going uptown only to go back downtown, just so I wouldn’t have to walk past that door. It’s good exercise and it’s finally beautiful outside, I reminded my racing mind. Once I arrived at the Thai place, ordered a glass of wine and waited for my friend K who was stuck on a bus in traffic, I exhaled, relieved and finally, sat down for the first time in what felt like a long time.

I looked around the dimly lit place with overpriced entrees and acceltic decor, analyzing the scene before me. Groups of people still dressed up for the derby, others on first dates, one couple who barely shared a word, another who couldn’t stop laughing. Ladies in tight dresses like mine, men who shouldn’t have another shot of sake at 8 p.m. Champagne in the corner, cocktails to my right, a pile of menus to the left.

And me.

Sitting alone in a busy place, getting lost in a whirlwind of considerations and forgetting, again, to consider myself. I’ve had a hard time admitting it — much less writing it — but I haven’t been in the best of moods lately. I’ve felt guilty for being unsatisfied, for being even the least bit sad, for not being so extremely thankful for everything I’ve achieved, everything I have in my life. I’ve beat myself up over the fact that I’m bored, that I’m flustered, that I’m incredibly frustrated and yes, scared. I’m not the girl who backs down from a challenge and never one to face something without a little questioning, but when nothing is exactly wrong, yet nothing feels right, what’s a girl supposed to do?

I’m not sure, but I’m starting with tonight, I thought as I closed my eyes and I took a sip of wine. With the majority of my friends in budding or settled relationships, I’ve had to try harder to push myself to be social. To go out and mingle, to get out of my cozy little apartment with my cozy little dog so I didn’t cozy myself into complete solitary confinement. And luckily, my lovely — and freshly single — friend K was up for trying a singles mixer. The cure, I’ve found, for feeling funky, for not having what you want, for feeling trapped or suffocated by your own life, is to do something different. I’m not sure if my diagnosis or my prescription will work, but at least it’s better than Chinese and another Netflix movie I won’t actually like at the end of an hour and 31 minutes.

After dinner, we walked through Times Square and giggled at the lights and the tourists instead of rolling our eyes. If we were braving the crowd of a “20s and 30s Cinco de May Singles Party” just a block from the chaos of Broadway, we might as well be in good spirits. As expected, the guest list wasn’t very impressive and obviously far past 39 than what we hoped. While the men were primarily much (much!) older or very (very!) short, there were a few who hung around us long enough to pitch in a margarita and hold at least somewhat decent conversation. We didn’t care though — we were busy trying on sombreros and shaking maracas, listening to the odd collection of music and attempting to dance.

One overzealous man who was nice enough, but not enough to make me want to see him past the bar, kept trying to pull me into him to sway along. He’d try to get my attention or wrap his arm around my waist as I tried to move away, until finally, he pushed my Southern manners too far and annoyance won over. With one more tug, I turned around and said:

I just want to dance! 

And there, with a glowstick wrapped around my head, three margaritas and a glass of wine in, people dancing around me and a drum booming, I nailed what it is that I’ve been feeling. I’ve been so terrified of nothing in my life ever changing. Of never making enough money to live by myself in an apartment I love. Of never feeling beautiful in my own skin. Of never meeting someone that’s special, of letting Mr. P haunt my memory forever. Of being the last single girl when everyone around me finds what they are looking for. Of never doing exactly what I’ve always wanted to do, where I want to do it.

Of not being able to get away from the wall and dance. Of not being able to let go of all of these silly little fears to find my own beat. My own pace and my own moves. All this time spent worrying and fretting over what’s next or what’s not, of holing myself up in a tiny room I pay too much for, of exhausting myself with trying to be perfect. Of trying to figure out the answers before I know what questions I even want to ask. Of trying not to the do the wrong thing and writing off everything that was good in the process. All of this time wasted anxiously awaiting for my life to begin…

…when really, all I needed was to dance. And all I really wanted was to dance alone. For now. Until I find my own rhythm and can let someone in for a spin.

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The Brown Slingback Heels

Tossing another abandoned sweater onto a pile nearly as tall as my desk, I admired my new-found ability to just let go of things. I’m bad about spring cleaning, mainly because I’m a little messy by heart and in my space space, and for my knack of attaching sentimental value to every knick-knack I own.

But this year is different — I couldn’t wait to clean out my suitcases and closet to switch from those bitter winter days to the bright summery ones, so I spent Saturday night in doing just that. With a race Sunday at 8:30 a.m., I gave myself permission to be boring and have a date with Mr.Windex and his friend the handsome broom instead of eyeing the crowd downtown.

As I went through my red suitcases — the ones that have been with me from day one in NYC — I found dresses I haven’t worn since I moved, bags so tattered they barely had straps and shoes without heels at all. Thinking of all the things I could buy if I just had more space (and um, money), I folded up what I didn’t want and hung up what I did, trying hard not to imagine dream scenarios in dream outfits during the process.

But then, in the middle of my clean up, in the middle of N’Sync playing on my 90s pop hits Pandora radio station (not ashamed), I came across those heels.

The heels that I didn’t wear at all last year since I couldn’t: the clasp is broken, the heel is unsteady and the shoe, admittedly highly uncomfortable. The heels that I once considered my own version of Cinderella slippers, bringing a love affair into my life with one simple stumble. The shoes that I thought I would keep no matter what, since they were the reason I met Mr. Possibility in the first place.

Right before I made the leap to Manhattan, I exchanged an incredibly ugly necklace (from yes, an ex) in for some cold hard store credit. Since the place doesn’t exist above the Mason-Dixon, I had to use it before my flight. Shopping around the aisles of things I didn’t want, I found one thing that I did: a brown pair of four-inch Jessica Simpson slingbacks that made my legs look killer. I instantly fell in love and easily used that gift card for them, determined to stomp the sparkly pavements, making my impression.

I was right– they eventually would make quite the first impression eight months later on that bus where I tripped in them, right in front of Mr. Unavailable, who as we all know, would ultimately become the impossible Mr. Possibility.

I walked those heels to death with any opportunity to any event or any short skirt that begged attention. Mr. P would comment on them before we went out: “Are those the shoes? Are you going to be able to stand?” He would tease me and I would promise to wear them with grace, and threaten to wear them on our wedding day, where I’d purposefully fall at the alter, making a scene just for us.

I don’t remember packing them up and tucking them away under my bed last fall — there is never enough room in any NYC closet for more than one season. But I did, even though they are entirely unwearable. Maybe then I still held onto the hope that they’d mean something more to me than Mr. P or that we would eventually get back together and I’d be sad if I didn’t have them.

But looking at them on Saturday night, thinking about the memories that come with them, that follow my step, I didn’t feel like I needed them anymore. Nothing left to hang onto, nothing more I wanted with them. Just a pair of shoes that are taking up highly-valued space in a closet that needs to be decluttered. The cost of fixing them would outweigh what they are worth, and the cost of holding onto what they represent, even more emotionally expensive.

And so, away they went to charity. To a place where maybe, someone else will find some piece of something in them, just like I did.

The truth is, they never really gave me a solid footing here. There were always a little too high to walk up and down subway (or apparently, bus) steps, and too skinny to support constant commuting. Perhaps I wasn’t confident enough to own them in the way that a woman who knows herself can — marching along without thinking, without worrying about that crease in the road ahead or the water puddle you see on a clear day. Those shoes didn’t give me my grounding here, and as much as I like to give him credit, Mr. Possibility didn’t either. He helped guide me for a while by showing me the city I love and giving me a glimpse into the love I dream of — but just like those slingbacks that playfully taunted our relationship, something was never quite right. Never quite as strong as I’d like. Never quite as stable as I needed. The support just wasn’t quite there.

The next day post-race, I stopped by TJ Maxx to pick up some running shorts and somehow found myself in the shoe aisle, eyeing a new pair of my beloved brown slingbacks. But unlike the other, these have a thicker heel. They’re a little lower, and yes more practical. They fit me better and can endure the two-avenue walk from the train to my job — no change of flats required. I don’t trip over my own feet and I can move to my own beat, without worrying about what’s ahead or who I’ll come across.

And I like them better. The next time I sway and bend, it won’t be because of the heels, it’ll be because I’m finally sturdy enough to let myself fall.

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Another Friday Night

One more stretch, you can do it, I encouraged myself early last Saturday morning, listening to the off-beat of my feet in Central Park. As I often do when my body can’t keep up with my racing thoughts, I become my own mental cheerleader and professional negotiator.  If I make it to that lamp post, I can have the large iced coffee instead of the medium at Dunkin Donuts. If I make it to the east side of the park, something amazing will happen.

If I make it. Something. Will. Happen, I told myself.

With a race in a week and not enough running logs in the last few weeks, I challenged myself to push more, even if all I wanted to do was curl up in my corner of the Upper West Side, far away from the city below. Far away from those unfortunate feelings I unfortunately still battle.

Last Friday night was a rough night. And even the splendor of a pretty park run that next morning didn’t get the negativity out of my sight. With my friends unavailable and spending weekends with their boyfriends, I was left to my own company to attend an engagement and birthday party. Though I was exhausted from the busy week at work, I put on a lace top and heels, ready to flirt and celebrate. But a handful of vodka tonics later (and one pickle back), I found myself staring down the bar, sad and defeated by the NYC dating scene I write so frequently about.

It’s not like it was the first night I wasn’t paid any attention by a man or the first time I wasn’t bought a drink. It wasn’t the first time I had a massive zit right next to my nose, while I watched tall, slender girls with dewy complexions march into the bar, turning heads and stealing attention. It wasn’t the first time I worried about how I looked (Pretty? Thin? Sexy?) or how I came across (Too nice? Too closed off?).

And though I know it’s silly and even though I’ve written about self-love so many times I can recite my own words, I felt invisible. Not good enough. Ugly. Unwanted. Like all I wanted to do was run home.

And so I did. I tried my best to hide the tears on the train and then again on my walk to Dunkin, to claim my iced prize for making the extra mile. While sucking up the tears, I listened to my mom tell me it’ll all work out. But it just doesn’t have the same effect when it hasn’t worked out… like, at all.

It’s funny advice that people who have found love always tell you: it’ll all work out! It’ll just come together! It’ll be so easy and so fast and it’ll feel right. You’ll just know. It’ll happen when you least expect it. It’ll happen when you aren’t trying.

It’ll happen when you find love in yourself first.

It’ll all work out… After you get through all the work of dating and flirting and bar hopping and profile shopping and having good (and bad) sex and getting your heart broken a few times and getting your hopes up and learning to get your hopes down and having an amazing first date and never hearing from someone again that you thought you liked.. and this and this and this…

And that. And on and on. And on. 

Logically and intellectually, I understand the advice. I accept it even. But emotionally, nothing could be more discouraging than promising things will work out and come together in some magical beautiful way, when currently, it’s anything but. Maybe somewhere deep down I know they’re right, but after playing the game and making the rounds for years… they’re suddenly just words to me.

Ones that aren’t facts or proven truths. Ones that show up when dates or love go sour. Ones that become an old adage I don’t look forward to hearing. Ones that make me feel less accomplished or less worthy or less something for having difficulty believing them time and time again.

But it’s when Friday night has pissed me off and I’ve pissed myself off the next morning by still caring that I do think of those words. Even if no one says them. Even if I don’t tell anyone I was upset. Even if I don’t actually trust them like I did three years ago. I just remember… It hasn’t worked out. Not yet. But maybe. Just maybe, it will.

After all… There’s always another Friday night.

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Delete. Delete. Delete.

Sitting in my blue fuzzy robe, drinking a glass of my favorite Chilean Cabernet, I chuckled as I deactivated every last dating profile I have.

Delete. Delete. Delete.

Writing about love for a living comes with its perks, one of the best being free access to online dating sites. I’ve never actively forked over cash to flirt with anyone but I have spent countless hours exchanging and browsing for men. It’s a lot like searching for an apartment — it’s not only hard to find one that meets your criteria but it’s exhausting, too.

Some guys cut straight to the chase and get to what they’re after (an extra martial affair, a threesome, hooking up) or others are so obviously searching for a wife that they ask you rather personal questions on date #1 (where do you see yourself in a year? What do you seek most in a lifelong partner? What size wedding band do you wear?). Kidding.

Kinda.

For a girl who is somewhere in between wanting a fun buddy and a long-term (and maybe forever) relationship — online dating has been too messy and too time consuming to deal with.

So I decided to get it out of my life — it’s complicated and demanding enough without throwing in a pool full of men that I have no desire to dip my toe in, much less take a dive with.  I’m a big supporter of getting online to find love — it can be effective and helpful, and at the very least, a great place to meet friends or people you’d otherwise never cross paths with. It’s a simple way to quickly land a drink date within a few hours if you’re bored and a casual way to investigate a new scene.

But for me, it started to become anther box in my weekly check list: buy groceries, get dog food, go for a jog, get dinner with the girls, find a guy to go out with Friday night on OkCupid or HowAboutWe, get my eyebrows waxed…

Ugh.

I blame myself completely — because I really sucked the fun out of it all. The suitors were probably perfectly good men and a handful might have had the capacity to be the next big thing but with my interest and commitment to the whole interweb game waning, it felt like a big waste of space in my Google Chrome bookmarks.

I don’t really care how or when or where I meet the next possibility. I wouldn’t be embarrassed to say we met online or at a trashy bar on the Lower East Side. How we meet is far less important than how we fall in love — but if I’m to do the latter, I have to out myself out there physically.

And at the same time, give myself a break.

It’s as easy as looking up on the subway or making eye contact more often. It’s looking past my glass of wine to see the men lurking at the bar. Maybe it’s not being ashamed of my rosy cheeks while running and smiling back at the guy who smiles at me. Or it’s letting friends pair me up with someone who is a tad shorter than I prefer. Or someone a little younger than the 30-something dudes I find myself attracted to.

Or it’s just going with it and being okay about it. Dare I say — forgive myself and freeing myself — from F.O.M.O. I might not go to a happy hour and I could skip cocktails. Maybe I don’t stay out late at all or I keep my latte as my coffee date instead of a man who likes espresso.

The point is, I think anyway, is to relax about it all. I’m good at obsessing and over-analyzing (and ahem, writing about it), and I’m even better at tying everything with a sweet bow and putting a happy ending at the end.

But that’s not how dating works — it just figures itself out somehow. You work at it, you take a break. You fall in love, you fall out of it, you get your heart broken, you recover. You retreat, you rebound, you cry, you get horny. You make lots of mistakes. You date those mistakes a long time. You break up again. You sleep with them for a while. You rebound again. You dye your hair. You cry really hard. You spend a lot of time alone. You’ll get online. You’ll delete, delete, delete. You’ll meet someone new.

Then you do it all over again and again.

Until you don’t. And then you start a new cycle of marital challenges and experiences, ones that might not be like dating but are most likely, equally as frustrating and at times, exhilarating.

I may not be scouring bachelors online or totally one hundred percent out there offline. But I’m open to love. I’ll let it come if it wants to. I’ll let it find me.

It just may not find me via a search engine. For now, anyway.

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Believing in the Unknown

I traveled to North Carolina last weekend for some much needed time with my family. The three days and some loose change of hours were blessed and bittersweet — we all knew the time was too short, as it always is, and the circumstances, not ideal. My father– the brawly fireman that fights as fiercely as he loves — has had three surgeries in the past six weeks. My mom has taken on the role of sole caregiver, bandage changer, and keeper of the finances, the household and the sanity, leaving her, unsurprisingly, a little insane.

With the kindness of my great job, I took off a day to help out and give as much support as I could offer. The trip was full of some tears and laughs, red wine and margaritas, shopping trips and steaks shaped like hearts, all underneath the transcending beauty of the bright blue Carolina sky. I always forget just how vast and endless it feels in the south — uninterrupted by the skyscrapers and smog, quiet and subtly enticing. I spent my mornings waking up early and retreating to our back porch, drinking coffee and just staring at the horizon, gulping in the fresh air and the crispness of the day. I walked barefoot with my family pup, Suzie, feeling the dew on the grass and the gushy, gooeyness of the mud in between my toes. I tiptoed from stepping stone to stepping stone to retrieve the mail and take out the trash; all the while my dad, sore from surgery, hollered out for me to come back inside. Then at nighttime in layers of jackets — my mom’s and then my dad’s because I forgot to bring one of my own — I looked up at the same familiar stars that I used to dream under, thinking about those same shining lights in Manhattan that I’d one day be part of.

It reminded me of being a kid. And I liked it.

Nothing can quite prepare you for the truly hard parts of being an adult– leaving the home you knew and the parents who raised you on hearty meals, boat rides and unconditional, encouraging love. Or learning how to save money for a future you’re not sure you’ll actually see, while spending enough to create memories today that you’ll tell your grandchildren about 40 years from now. Or how your 20s feel so incredibly long and intolerably fast all at the same time, making you squirm somewhere in between thinking you’re getting old and that you’re too young enough to care.

It’s confusing and maddening, and yes, beautifully educational.

At the ripe ‘ole age of 24, I’m proud of the decisions I made and of the zip code I selected — but as wonderful as my little apartment and job is, I still miss my mom and dad. I still long to be taken care of like and to be void of any responsibilities, cares or concerns. When my greatest achievement was catching those fireflies and sneaking a flash light under the covers so I could write in my diary. When boys only mattered enough to hold hands in the hallway and call you for half a minute at night. When your parents seemed ageless and young, incapable of being human, but rather all-powerful superheroes who rescued you from all of the bad guys – the boogeyman, the bullies and the insecurities that wrestled your mind and mirror. When time seemed like something obsolete and fascinating, when adulthood meant turning 22 and having all of your dreams already perfect.

Once you’re actually a 20-something, you realize that nothing is perfect and that maybe, nothing will ever be exactly how you planned.

But that’s why childhood needs to be sweet. So that when you’re sitting on a bus back from JFK on a Sunday night, longing for the comfort of your dad’s arms and your mom’s laughter, you savor the life you’ve already had. You can close your eyes, even if they’re filled with tears and your heart full of prayers. You can think about those memories to keep your warm and keep your hopes high. They remind you of where you came from and how you were able to be the lady you are, living this life you worked hard to create.

So that even when times are unsure or uncertain, for when you realize how little control you honestly have over everything, for when things change and so do you, you think about those possibilities you always knew were possible. You remember those people who told you that you could if you set your mind to it.

You open your eyes to look outside to that skyline, its dazzling puzzle luring you in, once again, to take another step. To give something another try. To keep believing in the unknown, in the things that have yet to come, the people you’ve yet to meet, the experiences you haven’t felt yet.

If you believed in them when you didn’t know any better than to believe in extraordinary, imaginary things, you can believe even harder when you do know better. Because that’s when believing gets tough, that’s when it becomes worth it.

That’s how dreams become more than stars glittering above your 7-year-old head on a chilly North Carolina night. That’s how you go from being a wanderlust kid to an adult that knows the unknown isn’t as scary as it feels, it’s where all the magic actually happens.